


One Day Off

by CassandraTheRed



Category: Team Fortress 2
Genre: All of it actually, Canon names are canon, Death, Gen, I Blame Tumblr, Suicide, lots of death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-25
Updated: 2016-11-25
Packaged: 2018-09-02 02:13:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,042
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8647711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CassandraTheRed/pseuds/CassandraTheRed
Summary: Everyone has a breaking point. Miss Pauling has reached hers.





	

Based on [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2uy-agsSTM) and done for my BFF. I'm going to hell.

________________

 

Misha is the first to die. 

Pauling hadn't thought he'd go down so easily, but apparently even a Heavy's not immune to having a fire axe buried in the back of his skull. She doubts he'd even heard her coming.

Dismembering him: that takes work, and each chop through flesh and bone just makes her madder and more determined. It's just like her grunt work: pulling teeth from skulls, sanding fingerprints from skin. Helen wants to give her just one day off a year? Fine. She's putting it to good use.

He doesn't respawn. Good. Her sabotage of the system had worked. Pauling pushes her glasses up with a bloody forefinger, streaking her face, and shoulders the axe.

She's got work to do.

***

Pauling hums to herself cheerfully as she hacks up Tavish's lifeless body, a little surprised that his blood is actually...well, blood. He'd been so drunk she'd sworn he'd leak pure alcohol. The red's a nice shade against her all-too-sensible shoes.  
It rather compliments the blood-and-ash dousing she'd got from splitting Pyro's chest open and flame-roasting his corpse.

She tightens her grip on the axe, fingers slipping in the blood until she wipes her fingers and the axe handle on the hem of her skirt. It's dark fabric. The stain won't show.

She's not through, after all.

***

The Spy bleeds on her sweater. She'd caught him in a card game with Dell Conagher--the Engineer had gotten the axe-in-the-skull treatment. His French teammate had been too shocked to avoid being shot.

She sits on the floor, pulling a run in one of her stockings, and cradles his head in her lap. He's not quite dead yet, though his eyes are filming and blood runs freely from the small hole in his forehead. Her pistol pulls to the left of center.

He works out a word, in a bubble of blood and saliva and pain. "Why?"

Pauling slides to her feet and eases the pistol into her hand. "Because I can."

This time her aim is true.

***

Getting the fire axe out of the Engineer's skull is difficult. She considers leaving it, but it might be useful. She still has Jane Doe to deal with, and the Soldier just might be as hard-headed as he looks.

She's singing to herself as she kicks at his door, spreading a small patch of red over the surface, grinning at it. This is the best she's felt in years.

He opens the door a crack, peering at her from under his helmet, gripping his shovel. Jesus Christ, he's in his pajamas: stars, stripes, eagles. 

"Miss Pauling...?" Jane Doe pushes out the door a little and stiffens. "You're bleeding!"

"No." She plants her gun in his gut and squeezes, once, twice. "You are."

She uses the shovel to chop off his head. It's crude, but it seems appropriate.

***

"Woman, yer out o' yer mi--"

Sniper's words end in a gurgle of escaping air as she slams the blade of his kukri into his neck. In the small space of his camper, the blood spray has little place to go but all over her, and Pauling basks in the heat, giggling, licking the edge of the blade.

God, she should've done this years ago.

***

Medic is hard at work on some project when she slips into the infirmary; he's at his desk, head down over a group of files, muttering to himself, his favorite dove Archimedes perched on his shoulder.

She shoots the bird first; the blood spray is magnificent, but even better is the dazed expression on the doctor's face as he swings round. Pauling fires again and her pistol clicks on an empty chamber.

She slings the gun away as Medic screams incoherent German and jumps to his feet. When he lunges at her, she steps in and swings the axe like a baseball bat, meeting him halfway. Not quite a home run, she thinks, relishing the crunch of his reluctantly yielding ribcage, but close enough.

She smiles grimly; the analogy doesn't escape her. For what she's got left, she needs a different weapon. Something light and fast. 

Bone saw? No; too cumbersome, too much effort. She studies an instrument tray on a side table and picks up a scalpel, twirling it in her fingers, testing its weight.

Medic's glasses crunch under her feet. This should do nicely.

***

"Doc!" The shout echoes even before Scout flings the door open. "Doc, Engie's dead, an' Spy, they're fuckin' dead! Really de--"

He stops: he's caught sight of the Medic lying on the floor, cut in two. He goggles for a moment, then sees her, too. "He's--Miss Pauling?! What's goin' on here? Fuck's happened, you're all bloody, is--"

She steps close to him and lashes out with the scalpel. The little blade catches him across the face.

He screams for a long time.

Pauling grins at her handiwork. She'd been right to save him for almost last. He looks good with his throat open and his face shredded and his eyelids lying in his lap. His shirt's stained a deeper, wetter red.

Scout watches her helplessly, dully. His breathing has started to falter. The remnants of his lips move but no sound comes out; she hasn't left him anything to speak with.

"Poor boy." Pauling rubs her hands over his hair, wiping off the blood. "Don't worry. It won't hurt much longer."

She'd relieved him of his gun right away. Now she weighs it in her hand and leans over, kisses his forehead.

"Sorry it had to be this way," she whispers cheerfully, and shoots him in the head.

She wipes blood mist from her glasses and unloads the gun. One round left. He'd been packing light--they all had. She'd surprised them, after all, with her one day off.

Pauling reloads the gun. For a moment she wanders around the infirmary, till she catches sight of herself in the mirror of a medicine cabinet. Stepping close, she pulls her glasses off. It's a good look, all this red. Maybe she needs a little more.

After all, she still has one round.

She puts the gun to her temple.

It's enough.


End file.
